Rejoice, Sixers fans. After two long and agonizing years of waiting for Joel Embiid to be healthy enough to play, there’s a light at the end of the tunnel. According to an interview that Sixers coach Brett Brown gave to SportsRadio 94 WIP’s Mike & Ike Show on Tuesday, it looks like Embiid is going to be able to suit up at the start of the 2016-17 season.
After saying that it’s his “strong belief” that Embiid will be ready to go next year, Brown took a moment to compliment the freakishly talented center.
“He’s downstairs beneath me as we speak, getting a lift and a workout. I had a chance to work him out personally a few days ago and the instruction from the medical staff all around us as we go nice and smart, nice and carefully, nice and slow relative to his pace. I think that he’s coming along tremendously.”
Brown also dove into the way that Embiid will get assimilated into the league. He said that there’s a chance that there will be some kind of minutes restriction put on the big man, who hasn’t played in a live basketball game since 2014 when he was a Kansas Jayhawk.
Should Embiid get onto the court and pick up the pace of the game relatively quickly, the 2016-17 Sixers are shaping up to be a pretty fun team. Sure, it still has a long way to go before it can be a title contender (or maybe even just a playoff team), but it will have a ton of young talent. In addition to Embiid, the Sixers will have guys like Jahlil Okafor and Robert Covington. Add in the possibility that Dario Saric may come over from Europe and the fact that it will have a bunch of picks in the Draft — in addition to its first rounder, it has Miami and Oklahoma City’s first-round picks and could have the Lakers’ pick if it falls outside of the top-3—- and the Sixers will have a nice, young core with plenty of talented guys ready to grow and improve as a group.
The crown jewel of said core for the last two years has been Embiid, but his inability to get onto the floor has coincided with two really bad seasons in Philly. With today’s news, it finally seems like the Sixers will be able to make the next step in what was affectionately known as The Process.
(via CBS Sports)